Safe and Sound
by ABitOfRomance
Summary: (One-Shot) Takes place during Chapter 3-6 of You're Always On My Mind. Miss. Peregrine's charges are finding different ways of wasting a Saturday afternoon, be that playing, drawing, or in Horace's case, worrying about his headmistress. Late at night, he hears her crying in her sleep, why is she crying? Will she be "okay"?


"Better be ready to catch it, Hugh." Jake warned him. While Miss. Peregrine was in the house doing her own thing, her charges were outside, not necessarily playing, but finding different ways of amusing themselves. Sitting near Bronwyn, who drew on the porch, her stomach laying parallel to it, propped by her arms, Emma wrote in a diary that she had since moving to Florida, this was a daily ritual of hers. Claire and Olive sat at a small, pink, plastic table with a few of their favorite toys having a tea party. The twins were in a secluded corner of the yard, conspiring against the rest of the house for all the children knew. Millard was simply staring up at the sky, daydreaming. He wondered what he would have looked like now.

When he was younger, before his peculiarity turned him completely invisible, a small Millard would look into a mirror and he recalled seeing a head full of dirty blonde hair. His eyes were dark brown and his nose was fairly long and straight, his lips were thin and his face was blemish free, save for a birthmark on the side of his forehead. He imagined he would look something like Horace, but then, it may have been years of influence. Enoch was underneath the tree with a tire swing playing with his "dolls", he commanded them to fight and behead one another only to fix them and continue the fighting.

Horace, sat on the steps of the porch, worried about Miss. Peregrine. He knew about her dreams and how she was unable to sleep most nights because he was the same way. Often times, he'd lay awake in bed, not wanting to know the future and he'd hear someone stir around, sometimes, she opened the bedroom door, at which point he'd close his eyes and make his breathing lighter. To the others it may have seemed like Miss. P. was simply checking on them, but he knew better. After having a terrible nightmare, she was making sure that they were there, safe and sound.

On the nights Alma did sleep, Horace would hear her mumbling, yelling for Victor to run and telling Fiona, "Fiona, sweetie, come away from the edge…" she would say as her voice cracked.

Most times, it sounded like she was crying, for what? He didn't know, maybe for Fi and Vic? Sometimes, Miss. Peregrine's dreams combined with his, it was all too scary for him which was why he was so funny, it was a defense mechanism and he wanted to see his mother smile…

 _CRASH!_

Horace looked up, as he had been staring at the ground, and damn near jumped out of his skin.

 _Holy mother of all that is good…_

He jumped up and ran over to where everyone was quickly converging on the scene. Before he even had a chance to ask, he heard the back door open, and noticed the yard was a mess. There were broken bits of doll on the ground, Enoch had abandoned where he was, wanting to know what happened. Olive and Claire's table had two empty seats, Olive ran to Enoch wanting to be held and Claire hid behind Emma's leg, as her hand softly rubbed Claire's back. Hugh and Jacob were the first to run to see what damage had been caused. Bronwyn looked over the fence, being that she was the last to see. She whispered to Millard what she saw as he had yet to know.

"What on earth is going on out here?" Miss. Peregrine asked as she put her hands to her hips. Horace noticed that she had paint on her hands that rubbed off on her shirt. She looked around.

 _Uh oh, her death glare…someone's going to get it._

Immediately, Horace straightened his back and looked to the ground.

"Well, uh…Jake and I were playing with the football and…" Hugh stuttered, Horace felt sorry for not only is friend but his brother. He looked to Hugh, trying his best to convey an aura of apology, maybe it would help him.

"I threw it too far and well…we broke the neighbor's window. It was an accident I didn't mean to…" Jake tried to explain. Miss. Peregrine simply put her hand up and asked the boys to accompany her. They quickly followed after looking at each other for a moment and silently asking Emma for help, it was futile as she had none to offer.

They all knew that 'play time' was over, but Emma was first to voice it, "Claire, Olive? I think it time to put the tea away…" she told them and the pair nodded their heads and went to put Woody Pride, Raggedy Annie and Andy, Freddy Fazbear and SpongeBob Squarepants back in their shared bedroom, as they were all meeting in a coffee shop in New Jersey, now it was time for them all to go home.

"What do you think is going to happen to them?" Emma asked still looking at the back door, left open slightly ajar.

"Probably have to apologize to the neighbors…" Horace voiced in. The group disbanded and began to pick up what they were doing and would have to prepare dinner, with Miss. Peregrine's help of course.

* * *

A few minutes later, when nearly everything was picked up, and after Jake and Hugh came back, they heard a loud clamor coming from next door. Millard called the older children over to sneak a peek over the fence.

"What do you think is going on?" The Invisible Boy asked to no one in particular.

"I don't know do you think she's still mad about the broken window?" Hugh asked, one of his bees escaping his mouth.

"Wouldn't she have come back by now, and…like…I don't know, ground us or something?" Jake questioned.

"I doubt you boys would be grounded, it was an accident, she might've just told us not to play with the football or something…" Enoch added.

"Good point, so what's going on?" asked Emma.

"Should I go with her?" Millard asked.

"No," Jake answered. "we'll just wait for her to get back."

"You think she's just going to the market?"

The older children looked over the fence and saw Miss. Peregrine leaving, only she was she not walking back toward the house, she was walking in the other direction. Emma noticed the dumbfounded look on her headmistresses face and the way she swayed slightly as she walked.

 _Maybe she's headed to the market to pick up a few things for dinner?_


End file.
